


Collected pieces

by pearl_o



Category: X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014) - Fandom, X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: M/M, Snippets, Tumblr, Vignette
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-01
Updated: 2016-03-22
Packaged: 2017-11-13 05:44:10
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 37
Words: 20,974
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/500134
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pearl_o/pseuds/pearl_o
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A collection of short-form fic, previously posted to tumblr and/or LJ, or anything that doesn't belong anywhere else. Content notes or warnings can be found on individual chapter headings.</p><p>Most recent:</p><p>33: burn it out (XMFC, Erik's terrible childhood/adolescence)<br/>34: old men together at the end of the world (DOFP, dark future timeline)<br/>35: different lights (post-DOFP tryst)<br/>36: when words aren't enough (XMFC)<br/>37: a stolen kiss (DOFP)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Don't pity the bullet;  pity the man

Sometimes after they make love, Charles looks down again upon his own hands, surprised to see his palms still smooth and whole and untouched. Touching Erik is like handling a jagged shard of glass. He is made up of a million pointed edges. Even his bones are too sharp, pressing out from his skin with too little flesh to soften them.

But Charles is still undamaged from it. _Look_ , he wants to say to Erik, _still no cuts. Nothing is ruined. Nothing has to be_.

Not a knife. Not a gun. Not a weapon to be wielded.

He lies next to to Erik’s sleeping form in the bed and listens in to his dreams, the echoes of metal and war and the coppery tang of blood.


	2. In a moment close to now

Of all the unkind things they've ever said to each other - of all the words that Charles has let thoughtlessly pass his lips, time and time again - there is one statement, at least, that he has never said to Erik. God knows he's thought it enough times, but he's never let it out, neither mentally nor aloud. That's something he's never had to regret.

_If you really loved me, you would..._

Fill in the blank: Listen. Change. Stay.

It would be, above all, a cruelty. A small one, perhaps, but as Charles ages he's realized more and more how those unkindnesses add up; how important it is to avoid them, to pay attention.

Just because one has a weapon doesn't mean one has to use it. If it would change anything, perhaps - but it wouldn't. It would be striking out for the sake of injury alone. 

If there's one thing Charles knows about Erik, it is the depth of the love he holds. Erik's love is something rich and fathomless and angry, beyond any understanding or logic. An act of God, a force of nature: a hurricane, a tornado, a thunderstorm. Erik himself fears it, though Charles never has.

The truth is: it's irrelevant. Love has never been their problem; it will never be their solution.


	3. Imagine this

Imagine the tale of Persephone in reverse. Imagine, instead of being lured down to the Underworld, she lured Hades up to her instead. Imagine Hades eats the fruit from her garden, those six seeds, sweet and juicy and perfect, even though he is the king of the underworld, even though those tastes are not for him, even though he should know so much better.

Imagine Hades eats those seeds, and even when he is back in the safety of his realm, in the darkness and the silence that he’s never doubted, he still can remember the light and the warmth of Persephone above.

Imagine how Persephone wordlessly embraces him every time he returns, and how he bides his time in the sunlit garden where he will never belong, never find the comfort he didn’t know he missed. Imagine how she lets him ago again each time, knowing that he will return to her, appreciating the half a life he gives her.

Imagine Charles’s lips, red as the ripest fruit, as he brings Erik to the surface from under the water.


	4. i've got rhythm

As Charles puts the record on, he says, “They say that the way a person dances can tell you a lot about them.” 

“Is that so?” Erik says, sipping his drink. 

“Mmmhmm. It’s all in the way you move, you see. Skill in dancing has a strong correlation with skills in other areas. The marital act, for instance.” Charles flashes him a smile. “Or so they say.” 

Erik says, “I don’t dance.” 

“Is that so?” says Charles. He crosses the feet between them, settling on the arm of Erik’s chair. “Something tells me you would pick it up very quickly.”


	5. A worried seam

“So intelligent, so powerful, and yet look at you,” Erik told him once, years into whatever their relationship was, as Charles lay still among the bedsheets, watching him dress. “In some ways you’re no different than a child,” Erik said, pulling his trousers back on, every piece of skin covered up taking him a little farther from Charles once again. “Only children think everyone is meant to be happy.”

“I refuse to ever think of hope as a weakness,” Charles said, mildly enough, though he knew Erik was aware of the depth of conviction behind his words. 

Erik dismissed the comment with a shake of his head and an utter lack of surprise. And yet, still, once he was fully clothed, he sat again by the side of the bed and kissed Charles goodbye, stretching the moment out longer and longer until, finally, he straightened up once more. 

Charles handed him his hat, fallen to the bed between them, and said: “Be well, my dear.”

As Erik left, he said nothing aloud; none of the things Charles could hear from his mind could truly be translated in words.


	6. This is why

It's this moment: looking down, his cock against Charles's ass, teasing, small movements that brush the head of his cock against Charles's hole where he's slick and open, open for Erik, and then that first push, as Charles's body stretches out even further to let him in, _in in in_ , as Charles makes room inside himself for Erik like he's hungry for it, like there's nothing else he needs in the world but this - and the noise Charles makes, only here, only now, right at this first moment of penetration, soft and broken and perfect.

Or this moment: afterwards, lying together in the afterglow, and Charles still hasn't recovered enough to speak, not out loud, but it doesn't stop him from talking, murmuring sweet nothings endlessly into Erik's head. Sloppy and affectionate and unbridled, and Erik would swear he was drunk, except that alcohol doesn't affect Charles this way; it's only sex that does. _Your body in my body_ , Charles says, curled around Erik like a vine, _my mind in your mind. Symmetry._

Or this one, perhaps: listening to Charles prattle on to someone about their mutations, and it is perfectly innocent, but Charles's tone is always the same like this, bright and interested, curious and pleased and all Erik can hear is that same voice telling him that _oh, darling, you do have the most_ marvelous _cock..._ , all sincerity and satisfaction. A wonder and a delight; Charles can never get enough.


	7. slice

Raven is the only one who can tell how much Erik misses Charles, how deeply he feels his lack, because she feels it too. But it doesn't bring them closer, uniting them with this loss they have in common. Instead, she feels herself resenting it in a way. Erik had, after all, only known Charles for a matter of months, but Raven has lost her _brother_ , her own family. How dare Erik mourn (even in his subtle, hidden way) as if their losses were equal?

Unfair, and perhaps even petty, but she can't help but watch how carefully he tends to his helmet, how vigilant he is against the slightest possibility of Charles reaching his mind. How sure he is of that danger.

Raven's mind is free and unprotected. There is nothing to prohibit Charles from total access if he ever chose to make contact with her. He never has.


	8. surprise

Charles had told Raven there was no need for her to pick him up at the airport, but she had ignored him. It was a long flight, and she'd seen Charles jet-lagged enough times to know that even though he could certainly get himself home himself, it would be easier for everyone if she took care of it. She could always use more "best sister ever" points, anyway, even if it meant dealing with airport parking.

And besides, Charles had been gone for almost a month. She was eager to see him again. 

She waited impatiently outside the security checkpoint, shifting her weight from one foot to another as she scanned the crowd. She spotted Charles, waved her hand to him to get his attention, and watched his face break into a grin. 

He walked quickly towards her. He stopped in front of her, dropping his bag at his side and opening his arms to wrap her into a hug. "It's so good to see you, Raven!"

"You, too, Charles," said Raven. She set her hands on his arms and looked him up and down. "Look at you, with a tan. I barely recognized you. What happened to the pasty nerd I love?"

"Mmm," said Charles, "fresh air. Sunshine. Happiness." He looked behind him, and for the first time Raven noticed the tall man standing a few paces behind them. "Erik, this is Raven."

The man stepped forward. There was almost no expression on his face. He was wearing a leather jacket and dark sunglasses, and he was working the very fine line between really hot and kind of creepy.

"Raven," Erik said. He nodded to her once. 

Raven looked from Erik's face back to Charles's.

"Raven," Charles said, and if he had been grinning before, his face was almost bursting now, "I'd like to present to you Mister Erik Lehnsherr." He reached out, took Erik's hand in his own and squeezed. "My husband."

"I--" said Raven. "What?"

"I told you on the phone I had a surprise for you!"

"Oh," said Raven. "I thought -- I thought you meant you bought me a scarf or something."

There was a curve to Erik's mouth that might have been a smirk, or maybe a smile. He twisted to pick up Charles's carry-on with his free hand, not letting ago of Charles's hand in his. "Perhaps we should get moving?" he suggested. "Out of people's way."

"Yes, of course," Charles said, "that's a brilliant idea."

She followed them down to the baggage claim, listening to Charles's excited chatter. She sneaked side glances at Erik - his profile was pretty perfect, she had to admit, she couldn't fault Charles there.

"So how did you guys meet?" she asked, as they waited by the carousel.

Erik looked towards her. "I was drowning," he said, "and Charles rescued me." She couldn't place his accent. European, somehow.

"Is that a metaphor or something?"

Charles laughed, but Erik didn't blink.

"Charles saved my life," he said.

Charles picked up Erik's hand and brought it to his mouth, pressing a kiss on the surface. Now Raven could see the dull gold ring on Erik's finger.

"Jesus, Charles," Raven said, shaking her head. "You're _married_. I can't believe it."

"I can hardly believe it myself," Charles said cheerfully. "Wonderful, isn't it?"

"It's amazing," Raven said, and if her voice was a little on the dry side, Charles didn't appear to notice. 

When Erik stepped forward to pick up the next bag, she tugged Charles close and whispered in his ear, "You have so much explaining to do here, you jerk."

"All in good time, my dearest," Charles said. "You _are_ going to love him, I promise you."

"Yeah, he seems like a fun guy."

Charles smiled. "Just wait." He pecked her cheek. "And I did get you a souvenir, you know."

"Is it a scarf? Or six foot man candy?"

"Well, it's a dress, in fact," Charles said, "but I'm certain you'll love it anyway."

"We'll see," Raven said, and then Erik was back with the suitcases, and she lead them out to her car.


	9. The shed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Inspired by [this picture of James McAvoy](http://i43.tinypic.com/2jshvm.jpg).

He knocks on the shed door - once, then a pause, then twice more - and waits. After a moment, the lock comes apart, floating in the air before him, and he can open the door.

It’s dark inside the shed, especially after the bright sun outside and he can’t see the other boy anywhere. He has to be there somewhere, of course, or else the metal couldn’t have moved. Charles clears his throat. “I brought you some food,” he says, raising his voice.

The boy steps out of a corner, behind where some old lawnmower has been stored. He’s good at hiding, Charles thinks. It must be a skill he’s cultivated. The boy’s face still looks suspicious, but Charles can feel that he’s somewhat less wary now. He’s willing to trust Charles, at least for now, at least this much.

“It’s just some sandwiches,” Charles says, placing the plastic bag on the ground between them - he’d learned enough, through the boy’s thoughts yesterday, to know that he wouldn’t react well to being touched. “There’s a couple more bottles of water, too.”

The other boy nods once, and then steps forward slowly. Trying not to seem too eager, Charles thinks. He sits down on the ground, crossing his legs, and takes a sandwich out of the bag, unwrapping it and biting into it. He closes his eyes, savoring the bite for a moment before swallowing, and then looks back to Charles.

“Thank you,” the boy says. It sounds like it doesn’t come easily. Charles thinks his accent might be German.

“I have to get back to the house before they notice I’m gone,” Charles says. “I’ll be back later. Is there - is there anything else you need?”

The boy shakes his head, but Charles hears his thoughts of _flashlight, something to read_. He’ll stop by the mansion’s library before he sneaks out this evening. 

“Goodbye, then,” Charles says. He closes the door behind him when he leaves, and waits long enough to make sure the boy has set up the lock, fastened it again. It’s the safest place on the property, especially with what the other boy can do, but Charles made him a promise yesterday, and he’s determined to see it through.


	10. Halloween

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Raven loves Halloween.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Posted on tumblr 10/31/12.
> 
> [Egg carton spider crafts!](http://www.freepreschoolcrafts.com/egg-carton-spider/)

Charles holds a giant Halloween party every year, but that is because Charles is basically a sucker for any excuse for a party (friends, booze and food? There's no bad there, in Charles's opinion, and then the preparation and decorations are half the fun, too) not because he has any special feelings towards Halloween in particular. 

Raven, on the other hand, _adores_ Halloween; it's her favorite holiday by a large margin. There's no other time of year where she has such an excuse to just revel in her powers, completely frivolously, pure enjoyment for weeks, transforming herself into one idea after another.

She always wins the party costume contest, of course. Charles isn't entirely convinced that it's a fair competition, considering, but Raven always tells him that he just has sour grapes, since he's still never managed to convince Erik to dress-up with him in a couples' theme costume. (Erik never dresses up at all, because he is that sort of spoilsport, and in general anti-fun in most ways Raven knows of. His only real interests that she's aware of, besides her brother, are playing chess and doing creepy things with knives and sheet metal.)

"I wouldn't want to dress up together even if he was willing!" Charles sniffs in response. "I'm not _that_ tacky," but Raven ignores his objections, because they are surrounded by spiders Charles made by hand out of pipe cleaners and egg cartons; she knows exactly how tacky Charles is.)


	11. the return of the coelacanth

Everything about him that was good, noble, and worthy - all of that had left him years before, Erik thought. It was dead and buried in the ground, long ago. Barely even a memory, if no one alive had ever seen it. 

Charles disagreed. Of course he did. Just because you can't see it, he said, doesn't mean it isn't there still. I found something that night, unexpected and precious in the ocean waters, and your heart still beats, your blood still runs. Trust me: I know these things. I'm a scientist. Listen to me. Listen. Trust me. Kiss me again.


	12. shiny and full of body

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So sometimes I write stories that are, like, *about* things. And other times, I text pocky_slash to say “I think I should write something about Erik coming in Charles’s hair.”

"Oh come, Charles, don't sulk," Erik called from the bed to where Charles had disappeared into the bathroom. "I'm sorry. It was an accident!"

"One time is an accident," Charles said, voice muffled over the running faucet. "Twice is a *habit.*"

"Look, you're the one who came up with the idea in the first place. You wanted me to mark you, right?"

Which was not to say Erik had objected. He'd been happy to oblige Charles's whims in this, just as he was with every one of Charles's new suggestions - at least in this aspect of their life. When it came to their bedroom activities, Charles seemed to be unceasingly inventive and adventurous, coming up with ideas that would never have occurred to Erik. They weren't always successful, but more often than not they were. And this had been even hotter than Erik had anticipated: Charles on his knees, eyes closed, head tilted back, his mouth hanging open in anticipation as Erik masturbated before him.

It had been amazing, really, right up until Charles's squawk of outrage at the finish.

"Not like this! It's completely different."

"How so?"

"Coming on my face is hot," Charles explained. "Coming on my throat, or my collarbone, striping my skin, *that's* hot. Coming in my hair is, is - disgusting. And frankly, not a little disrespectful."

"Well," Erik said, "you have to admit that seems rather arbitrary."

Erik didn't laugh, but he was sure Charles sense his desire to, a feeling that was confirmed when Charles stuck his head out of the door again to glare. His hair was damp where he'd splashed the water on it, and his face was pink and clean-looking in a way that gave an overall impression of being quite young and innocent, in a way Erik knew quite well to be untrue. Charles was as filthy as he was brilliant, or arrogant, or impossible; innocence had never come into it.

"I thought you said you *like* being degraded a little," Erik said.

"Oh, shut up," Charles said crossly.

"I already apologized. What else do you want?"

Charles leaned against the bathroom doorway, still naked, and gazed at Erik for a few moments, gnawing thoughtfully on his lower lip. "I suppose I could let you make it up to me," he allowed.

"Making it up to him" turned out to involve the toybox under the bed, Charles's favorite dildo (the one that was "*almost*" as big as you," as Charles liked to say admiringly), and then, later, the fetching of a cup of tea and a late snack to be brought back to the bedroom and delivered to Charles, boneless and sated in their bed.

"All right, fine, you're excused," Charles said, half-mumbling the words against Erik's chest. "Just don't let it happen again."

"Yes sir, no sir," Erik said. "Just as you say, sir."

Charles kicked at him, but between Charles's sleepy laziness and their position, prone and wrapped around each other, it was an entirely ineffectual move. Erik tightened his grip around Charles's waist and nuzzled against the top of his head, keeping strictly to himself the observation that the hair there still smelled faintly of jizz.


	13. i think we're alone now

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> From the tumblr first line prompt meme. First line provided by pocky_slash.

"It's okay," Charles assures him, "my parents are gone for the weekend."

The whole situation has slowly been making Erik more and more uncomfortable. Last week at the lake, after Charles saved his life, it had been different. Erik doesn’t know how to describe it, even to himself, with all the words that occur to him seeming too cliched and sentimental to explain it accurately, but - it is like, somehow, meeting the only other person in the world, when before you hadn’t even had the slightest idea they existed. That surprising, thrilling, and natural.

Here, in the bright light of day, it’s different. Every single thing reminds Erik of the differences between them. Charles’s home is large, like a mansion or a museum, an estate rather than a house, bigger than the entire block where Erik grew up, let the crowded one bedroom he and his mother shared, or the car he spent two months living out of when he first arrived in this town.

And Charles looks so young and fresh and clean - he’s even still wearing his uniform blazer and trousers from his day at school. Erik never finished high school; he ran away from Shaw two months before graduation.

And now Charles is telling him that his parents are out of town, in that confident, knowing voice, and Erik feels like nothing so much as a dirty old man.

“Not *old*, surely,” Charles says mildly, stopping on the landing to the stairs and turning to face Erik. Any annoyance Erik might expect to feel at the invasion of privacy is overwritten by the amazement he feels every time Charles demonstrates his wonderful ability. “You can’t even drink legally yet.”

“Old enough,” Erik says. “Older than *you*.”

“Hey,” Charles says, more quietly now, and he takes a step forward, resting his hand lightly on Erik’s bare forearm, making his skin tingle everywhere. “Look at me.” Charles’s eyes are wide, calm and patient. “It’s me. Okay?”

The buttons on Charles’s corduroys are metal, and the band of his wristwatch, too. Erik tugs them gently with his ability, pulling Charles in closer, until they are pressed together, chest to chest.

He bends his head down the inches between them and kisses Charles, carefully and with all of his intent.

When the kiss breaks, Charles’s face is flushed, almost dazed. Charles, Erik has already determined, is not much used to being surprised or caught offf guard. He is always sure, of himself and of everything else.

“All right,” Erik says. “It’s just you and me. Now what?”

Charles smiles, a little wicked. He’s just as beautiful now as he was that first moment Erik laid eyes on his, bedraggled and cold and wet and glowing with the light of the moon against the water. “Now,” Charles says, “whatever we want,” and he takes Erik by the hand and leads him up the stairs.


	14. the bodyguard

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> From the tumblr first line prompt meme. First line by aesc.

Of course major public figures need a bodyguard, Emma informs him, and sure he's not three hundred pounds of muscle, but when it comes to personal security telepaths are worth their weight in gold... and if he's hot, well, consider it a bonus.

It doesn’t matter whether Erik might disagree, though of course he does - for one thing, having a bodyguard at all seems redundant, given that nobody can get anywhere close to Erik without him being able to sense any weapons they might have on them, and for another thing, Emma is not exactly objective on the subject of how telepaths are simply the most qualified people for any given job. 

But the whole point of having Emma as his assistant is that she can make these decisions, and that he doesn’t have to worry about any details like this at all. She’s his buffer to the entire outside world; all he has to do is concentrate on his art. 

He’s almost forgotten the entire conversation already when Emma finally brings the man in to meet him.

Erik looks up from his desk and discovers immediately that Emma had indeed been correct in at least one respect. The man is gorgeous.

The man steps forward, offering his hand to Erik to shake, and he keeps hold of it afterwards long than is really necessary. His eyes are sparkling as he says with a smile, “Hullo. I’m Charles Xavier. I’m here to guard your body.”

They both ignore Emma’s loud, disgusted huff of breath beside them, and Erik keeps his gazed locked with Xavier’s and smiles widely in return.


	15. another high school au

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> From the tumblr first line prompts meme. First line provided by listerinezero.

Erik watched as Charles slowly bent over to tie his shoelaces.

“You’re looking at my butt,” Charles said, without turning around to face Erik.

“What?” said Erik, jerking his gaze away. “I am not!”

Charles stood up again, just as slowly, and said cheerfully, “It’s okay. It’s not like how Moira gets bad when people look at her chest when she wears tight sweaters. I don’t mind you looking at my butt.”

Erik scowled. “I was _not_ looking at your butt.”

They had stopped in the middle of the sidewalk when Charles’s laces came untied, but now Erik started walking again. Usually they walked home from school at a pretty slow pace, so there was plenty of time to talk the whole way home, but now Erik walked faster, in longer strides, even though Charles was six inches shorter and he knew he would have to scurry a little to keep up.

“Seriously, Erik, it’s okay,” Charles said, once he caught up with Erik again. There was an earnestness in his voice that was just irritating Erik all the more. “I like it-“

“I’m not gay.”

“I didn’t say you were-“

“I have a _girlfriend_.”

Charles snorted. There was an element of withering scorn in his voice as he said, “Yeah, from summer camp. You haven’t even seen her in six months.”

“What do you know about it?” Erik said. “You’ve never even kissed a girl.” 

“I have, too!”

“Pecking Moira on the cheek in third grade doesn’t count,” Erik said, rolling his eyes.

“I made out with Gabby Haller at Scott’s Christmas party,” Charles said, and Erik stopped walking and went still. “You weren’t there. You were upstate visiting your cousins.”

Gabby Haller was three inches taller than Charles. They must have looked ridiculous together, Erik thought viciously. Her hair was frizzy and she was flat as a board. “You never told me that,” Erik said after a moment.

“I never told you that Emma let me touch her breasts after the homecoming game, either,” Charles said. His face was flushed and there was an air of challenge to his posture. 

“That’s great,” Erik said. “That’s really great, Charles, good for you. I’m so happy for you. Why don’t you just go out with Emma, then?”

“I don’t want to go out with Emma!” Charles yelled. “What is wrong with you, Erik? I like _you_ , you jerk.” He exhaled loudly. “Ugh, whatever. Don’t bother walking the rest of the way with me, I can make it home by myself.”

“Fine,” Erik said, and he stood there and watched while Charles stomped off alone.


	16. "I told you so."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> From the tumblr first line prompts meme. First line provided by anonymous.

“I told you so.”

Charles gritted his teeth together. “I’m not in the mood tonight, Erik.”

Erik was not put off by the lack of invitation. He walked further into the room, stopping only to stand beside Charles’s desk. “They almost killed one of your children out there today. Your children, who were only there trying to *help*.”

“I know exactly what happened today,” Charles snapped. “I was there.”

“Were you?” Erik said, in a voice that would seem mild if you didn’t know him well enough to hear the rebuke beneath it. “I was under the impression you were back here the entire time, while you sent them out to fight.”

“I was with them the whole time,” Charles said, quiet and deadly. He gazed up at Erik, and he could see Erik deciding to back off, just a step, for now. Their relationship was a long game, after all, and there was always another round to be had in the future.

They both knew, just as they both knew that the reasons their words hit each other so hard was because they were so often what they wanted to believe, or what they were afraid they already did.

“What are you here for, Erik?” Charles said, wheeling himself away from his desk and over to the liquor cabinet. He poured himself a drink. “An argument? A chess match? A fuck?”

“Do I have to choose one?”

Charles shook his head, snorting, and he poured a glass for Erik as well, as behind him he felt the cool familiar patterns of Erik’s mind as Erik removed his helmet and placed it upon Charles’s desk.


	17. Three sentence AUs

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Three-sentence fics written for meme where prompts consist of a pairing and an AU setting.
> 
> All of these are Charles/Erik except the very last two, which are Emma/Erik and Jean/Wanda.

**Charles/Erik, ghosts**

“Did you ever figure out what those weird noises were at your new place, Charles?” Raven asked after they ordered their food and given the waiter their menus.

Charles took a sip of water before lying to her - oh, that, he had figured it out, it was the combination of the drafty old building and maybe raccoons outside. Raven wouldn’t believe the truth, and Charles wouldn’t be able to blame her; he wouldn’t believe it, either, if he hadn’t lived through it: finding the hiding spot in the closet, with the journal and photographs of a Nazi hunter from the 60s; the slow sense of a presence by his side, night by night; the way the metal in the place had begun to shake in response when Charles spoke to himself out loud; and, finally, just this morning, the letters he had seen written in the fog of the mirror when he stepped out of the shower, H-E-L-P-M-E.

**Charles/Erik, newlyweds**

However much Erik had complained during the planning of it, he had to admit that the reception had turned out great - but it was still long, especially when he couldn’t keep himself from glancing at Charles constantly, watching Charles’s laugh and happy glazed eyes and the ring that seemed to flash ridiculously brightly on his finger every time he moved his hand. It was an excruciating pleasure/pain, waiting, when all he wanted to do was drag Charles away to their hotel room and start their wedding night.

He imagined it a thousand different ways as the party went on, but as it turned out, the evening ended in a way Erik hadn’t anticipated - with Charles, soused beyond all reason from the hours of booze and toasts, passed out cold on the bed; for better and for worse, Erik thought wryly, as he undressed Charles, tucked him in, and climbed into the bed beside him.

**Charles/Erik, journalists**

It was always a late night, putting the paper to bed, but in relative terms, at least, they’d finished early tonight. Watching Charles gather his coat and scarf from his desk, Erik could tell he was feeling the same pleased, satisfied triumph that Erik was.

“Charles-” Erik said, planning to bring out the somewhat involved excuse for them getting drinks together, the one he had been practicing in his head all evening as they worked together, but when Charles turned to him with that smile, Erik thought to himself, _Don’t bury the lead, Lehnsherr_ , and improvised instead by saying, “I like you, and I think you should come home with me.”

**Charles/Erik, merpeople of Atlantis**

“Come now, Charles,” Erik said, “you can’t tell me you actually believe in that laughable old myth - it’s just distorted memories of senile bats who spent too long with their heads above the water. How would landpeople be able to breathe?”

“All I’m saying is that there is much out in the world we haven’t discovered yet,” Charles replies stubbornly, “and after all, Erik, we’ve seen evolution lead to things even more marvelous and unlikely.”

**Charles/Erik, both single dads**

“Daddy, can we have another sleepover at Wanda’s house tonight?” Jean says blithely, causing Raven to pause with her coffee mug halfway to her mouth and raise her eyebrows in a wordless yet eloquent gesture.

“Not tonight,” Charles says to Jean out loud, and privately to Raven, _Shut up_.

“Whyever not, Charles?” Raven says. “I hear sleepovers are fun for kids of all ages.”

**Charles/Erik, the ocean**

Erik hates the beach house - he refuses to call it a cottage, no matter what Charles may say. Charles seems to have no problem spending days sitting on a deckchair and reading, or taking hikes across the wet rocks, or skipping stones across the waves, but Erik feels useless and trapped here, in a cage of luxury and boredom that Charles has bought.

The front of the house faces a road, and the back of the house opens out into the vast expanse of the ocean; but both of those paths lead away from Charles, and so Erik can’t take a step in either direction.

**Charles/Erik, state fair**

The fair, Erik thought, was little more than a celebration of human mediocrity, crowded, hot, and intensely banal.

Still, he had to admit, however grudgingly, that Wanda and Pietro appeared to be having the time of their lives, staring with wide eyes at the animals, the displays, the booths, and joyfully throwing their tiny bodies into every one of the rides - rides that Charles, wonderful Charles, had volunteered to accompany them on. 

Erik bit into a funnel cake, watching as they began to walk back towards him (Charles laughing with evident delight, one of Erik’s children attached to each arm), and thought that perhaps the experience was not all bad.

**Charles/Erik, authors**

It has been five days since Charles wrote a word, and he is certain he is losing his mind. 

“There’s no such thing as writer’s block,” Erik says, rolling his eyes from the other side of their bed, “which you should know better than anybody; it’s simply a matter of proper _discipline_.”

Charles briefly considers smothering Erik with the pillow - if nothing else, perhaps he could write his memoir of the crime from prison.

**Charles/Erik, office AU**

“I just don’t see what’s so hard about loading the goddamn copier correctly,” Erik grumbled, “or why I have to be the one to fix it every time people screw it up.”

“You have to fix it because you’re the only one who knows how,” Charles says patiently. He chooses not to volunteer the information that he’s been known to give incorrect directions to people on occasion, to cause a paper jam; there are some disadvantages to having the cube next to the copier, but Erik’s frequent visits make up for many of them.

**Erik/Emma, slavefic**

He was supposed to keep his head down and his eyes averted, but instead Erik tilted his chin up, watching openly as the slave master escorted the rich bitch, through, presenting the kneeling slaves for her approval.

The master clucked his tongue when she stopped in front of Erik, raising her foot to dig the point of her high heel into his thigh to watch him wince, and the man quickly protested, “Oh, no, my lady, you don’t want this one, he’s nothing but trouble, let me take you to one that will please you better-“ 

The bitch smiled at Erik, and he hated her even more as she slowly drawled, “I like them with a little spirit; it’s more fun that way.”

**Jean/Wanda, roller derby girls**

Wanda is still standing at her locker, just finished getting dressed, when Jean pulls her into a hug from behind.

“You did so great out there,” Jean says happily. “I told you there was nothing to be nervous about!”

Wanda turns around in her arms, so she can see Jean’s face, clean and shining and happy, and she wonders not for the first time at the difference between this Jean and the Phoenix who dominates the bouts, fierce and electric and merciless; her girlfriend, Wanda thinks, doesn’t just contain multitudes, she contains universes.


	18. let him down easy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm uncertain as to whether this should be tagged Erik/Emma or not, as nothing happens between them and Emma is very clear that nothing ever will. Also contains references to Emma/Shaw and (natch) Charles/Erik.

Erik comes to her room on the third night after her so-called rescue from the CIA facilities.

Frankly, Emma is surprised he waits that long.

"Not tonight, sugar, I have a headache," she says, eyeing him up and down in the doorway. "Actually, not any night, I'm afraid."

Erik scowls at her, which only makes her want to laugh. She turns away from him, crossing the small room to sit on the edge of her bed, crossing one leg over the other. It's a stretch, actually, to call it a bed: more of a cot. So far, the Brotherhood's accommodations, though perhaps preferable to the federal government's, do not come close to the comfort that Sebastian had always managed to provide.

Erik follows her into the room uninvited and closes the door behind himself. He's not an ugly man, by any means, though the ridiculous helmet does its best to hide his attractiveness. Still, when Emma looks at him she can't help but see that pathetic scared boy she first encountered from his own memories on the boat, and then the crazed creep who bound her up in the USSR. Even at his most insane, Shaw was never out of control like that.

"You let Shaw into your bed, but you're too good for me?" Erik says, his voice low and dangerous.

She raises her eyebrow at him. "Do you even know why you want me, sugar? Because I do. I can see right through you, helmet or no helmet. Do you want me to fill that gap from your telepath, too, or do you just need to prove something to yourself by fucking what Shaw fucked?" 

Erik's face is furious and cold. She suspects he thinks he is a lot better at looking expressionless than he really is.

"If you're just that desperate for a lay," Emma continues, "the blue girl's only two doors down. I'm sure she'll let you do whatever you want to her."

A muscle in Erik's jaw twitches as he clenches his teeth. He turns away from her without another word, opening the door with his powers only. Briefly, Emma considers giving him one more piece of advice - from what she knows of Charles Xavier, the fool probably would take Erik back into his bed if Erik made the effort, but no telepath with the least amount of self-respect is going to allow that _thing_ on his head to come close - but she decides against it. She's given Erik enough to think about for one night.


	19. dare-verse snippet

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Erik hates winter break. (Continuation of [this universe](http://archiveofourown.org/series/19308).)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for an anonymous tumblr prompt for this universe and the words college, home, uncertainty.

Erik hates winter break. The weather is miserable, the kind of wind and snow that's not even picturesque, just gross and uncomfortable, and so he spends all day locked up in the apartment, which feels smaller all the time. He doesn't celebrate Christmas, so he doesn't have that to look forward to, and Hanukkah is boring and already over anyway. All of his college applications are in by now, so even that, which has been pretty much the only thing on his mind for the last three months, isn't there to distract him.

And then, of course, Charles is gone, which is really the worst of it. Everything else is just details, compared to that. Charles's mom and stepfather dragged him off to France and Switzerland as soon as school got out, and he's not going to be home until New Year's. Erik's boyfriend is thousands of miles away, skiing and drinking hot cocoa in real castles, and Erik is alone, curled up on the couch in his mom's old afghan, watching Harry Potter movie marathons on cable. It's terrible. It's pathetic, and Erik kind of hates himself.

The worst part is that Charles emails him every day, and it's literally the highlight of Erik's day. Sometimes Charles tells him about what he's been up to, the different places he and Raven have been going or things they've been doing. Sometimes he just tells Erik that he misses him and he loves him. Yesterday he attached a really blurry and badly-lit picture of himself, shirtless but otherwise covered up by blankets, alone in a big white hotel bed, and no message other than he can't wait to get home and see Erik again. Erik locked himself in his room and jerked off three times in a row without stopping.

None of this should matter that much - none of it _would_ matter that much, except... it's not about Charles being away for another week. It's about a deeper realization, one that Erik has been avoiding for a while now, which is the sickening uncertainty about their future. Six months from now, they'll both have graduated. He knows Charles is going to end up at some Ivy League school, or maybe even Oxford, some place Erik probably wouldn't get in and wouldn't be able to afford even if he did. 

He can't just follow Charles around like a puppy; he has his own education, his own future to think about. He can't imagine breaking up with Charles, either. So that means he's going to have to figure out some way to be in a long-distance relationship without - without being like _this_.

One week until Charles gets home. Six months until everything changes. It's like Erik has a clock inside his chest, counting down every tick with his heartbeat.


	20. focus

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Content notes: kidfic, modern no powers AU.

Erik has half of his attention concentrated on Lorna as he pushes her stroller back and forth over and over the same six inches of the sidewalk next to the bench, and the other half on the play structure, tracing Pietro's light and Wanda's dark heads over and through every piece of it as they run and shriek among the crowd of other kids. He has it down, now, to almost a science, but he doesn't have any concentration to spare beyond the three of them, so when the man speaks to him it's a total surprise.

"Mr. Lehnsherr, is it?" 

Erik has too much self-control to jump, but his grip tightens suddenly on the handle of the stroller, breaking his rhythm, and he looks up quickly to the intruder, squinting against the late morning sunshine. 

Short, handsome, dark hair, blue eyes. He's familiar, but it takes Erik a second to place him. He's seen him around here a million times, attached to the little redheaded girl Wanda's so fond of. 

"Yeah. I'm Erik. You're Jean's dad?"

"Guardian, actually," the man says. He's holding two cups of coffee in his hands, and he presents one to Erik with a flourish. "This is for you. Cafe americano, yes?"

"Uh, yeah," Erik says, a little confused. The man beams when Erik takes the coffee from him, though, and immediately sits down on the bench beside him.

"I'm Charles Xavier, by the way."

Erik takes a swallow of his drink and nods.

"I've seen you around here every morning, so I thought I'd make your acquaintance," Charles says. "The girls seem to be fast friends already."

Erik nods again. Up close, Charles smells really good. It's distracting. Erik's not sure he can remember the last time he was this close to someone who didn't smell like crayons or baby powder. He busies himself leaning over the stroller, fussing with the blankets, but Lorna's still asleep. 

"They're really lovely children," Charles continues.

It's stupid, but as good as Erik is at dismissing stupid or insincere compliments or small talk when it comes to himself, he can't do it with the kids. He puffs up whenever someone says anything positive about them, because some part of him is convinced it's all true and even less than what they're due. They're perfect. They're obnoxious little brats half the time, but still: they're perfect. 

He clears his throat and says, "Thank you."

Jean and Wanda appear suddenly at the top layer of the play structure, and Jean pokes Wanda and points over to where Erik and Charles sit. Both girls wave with a ridiculous amount of enthusiasm. Erik and Charles both wave back politely.

"From what Jean's said, I gather you're a single father...?" 

Charles lets his intonation rise at the end, but it's not really a question, so Erik doesn't respond.

"I have to admit, I never realized what a struggle it must be raising a child alone before Jean. Not that I thought being a parent was _easy_ , of course, but I suppose it's one of those things where you really have no idea what you're getting into until you're there already. It's enough of a challenge with one, though, I can't imagine how you manage with _three_."

Erik doesn't expect to answer that, either, but somehow something comes out of his mouth nonetheless. "I wonder the same thing myself. Frequently."

It gets him a smile from Charles, wide and pleased and friendly. Like he's made Charles's entire day with a single sentence.

"Is the children's mother still in their life at all?" Charles asks, earnest and curious. 

_That's none of your business_ , Erik thinks, but what he says is, "Mothers." Charles blinks at him, and Erik says, "The twins' mother died when they were very small. Lorna's mother just wasn't interested in raising a kid." It's just the four of them, has been since he brought Lorna home that first night. Erik likes it that way. They're a family, perfect and complete, all round edges and no corners.

He's unsettled by how part of him wants to explain more to Charles. Say, _I know it makes me sound promiscuous, but really I can count the number of women I've been with on one hand. Magda was the only one you could even really call a relationship. Lorna's mom was the first person I'd even touched after she died, and then it was just blind luck..._

Erik's never felt the need to justify his life or his choices to anyone, and if he was going to start, he can't imagine why it would be to a stranger in the park.

"Listen," Charles says, shifting a little, and just the presence of his body beside Erik is distracting, close enough that Erik can feel the warmth of his thigh and his upper arm where they're close to touching. Erik looks back at the play structure, the quick one-two _blond boy, dark girl_ marco polo identification. Safe, safe.

"Would you like to join me for dinner sometime?" Charles says softly, and when Erik glances back to him, he's dragging his teeth along his bottom lip, which is shiny and red and ... and obscene, perhaps, Erik thinks. It's an unexpected thought, but not an unpleasing one. 

Instead of saying _no_ , Erik says, "I don't have a babysitter."

Charles smiles again, rather gloriously, and says, "I have quite a good one."

"Lemme give you my number," Erik says after a moment, and he can't lie: the way he sees the triumph flash in Charles's eyes does something pretty special to his ego, right there.


	21. you've had a hold on me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Content notes: underage, always-a-girl!Erik.

Erika is curled up in the corner of the couch, reading a book, when Charles climbs up the ladder. He's out of breath, though he tries to hide it from her -- he had dropped his bags on his bed as soon as he got home, and then practically ran his way across the grounds to the treehouse to get here as quick as he could. Or, well, as close to running as he could, given the handful of inches of snow on the ground.

Erika sets the book down on the cushion, and brings her knees up close to her chest. "I thought you said you'd be back by noon."

"The flight was delayed," Charles says. Salt in the wound, the few extra hours in his mother, stepfather, and stepbrother's company, in a crowded airport, no less. Charles had gotten a headache from the sheer amount of annoyance and unhappiness and irritation of the minds surrounding him in every direction, and he'd ended up stealing one of his mother's pills from her purse and slept most of the flight. "I hope you weren't waiting too long."

Erika shrugs. "It doesn't matter." It's nicer here than at home, anyway, Erika thinks. Charles is almost certain she doesn't intend for him to catch the thought, but he does nonetheless, even the slight bitter edge to it -- that the treehouse, a throwaway plaything for his family, is in better shape than the apartment she and her dad share. 

It was built when Charles was quite little, but he didn't really start using it much until after Mother and Kurt got married, right before he started middle school. He appreciated it so much more, once the house got so much more unpleasant. It's warm out here, even in the winter, and cozy, and most of all _private_. If it had wifi and food delivery, he could live here.

He and Erika used to spend hours and hours out here, afternoons after school and whole days during summer vacation. It's been a long while, though, since the last time they hung out here. Erika emailed him, a few days after he left for Christmas vacation, with plans to meet up when he got back, but Charles still doesn't know why.

Charles takes off his things, hat and scarf and coat and boots, and leaves them at the edge of the room where Erika's already lay. He runs a hand through his hair, feeling a little self-conscious about it, and sits on the opposite end of the couch from Erika. To his surprise, she turns sideways, letting her legs extend to the ground, facing Charles as she sets an arm across the top of the couch.

Charles isn't used to this. It's been ages now since she started shying away from him, setting her body language clearly and unmistakably to don't get too close. Not that Charles is particularly good at body language, but the tint of her thoughts, the clear walls that weren't there before, gave the message just as clearly. 

He's always taken his cues from her. He feels a little nervous, now, though he doesn't know why. He turns in his seat to mirror her.

"So what's up?" Charles says, trying for a casual smile. "Did you have a good break?"

Erika shrugs. She's picking at a loose thread in her jeans, and for the first time Charles notices what she's wearing - an oversized gray sweatshirt with the logo of the company her dad works for, and ratty jeans with paint stains dotting the fabric. That's out of character for her, too, Charles realizes; Erika always takes what seems like a ridiculous amount of pains to look flawless. When they were younger, Charles had gone shopping with her a few times, to the thrift shops and secondhand stores she shopped at, and watched her pick out the few things that met her perfectionist standards, half of which would go on to be altered by her sewing machine as well. Once or twice he even watched her do her make-up and hair, a lengthy and tedious process that left her looking untouchable and perfect and a little scary. 

Erika hasn't let him see her like that in years, of course, but he doesn't doubt her routine is similar. But she's not wearing make-up today, either, as far as he can tell.

"It was fine," Erika says. "Boring. I got a lot of studying done. Worked on my mutation exercises." She hesitates before saying, "I had a lot of time to think."

"Yeah?" Charles says. "About what?"

Erika frowns, looking almost angry, although the faint awareness of her thoughts Charles allows himself doesn't feel angry. "About you, mostly."

Charles freezes for a moment, and has to remind himself to breathe. He looks away from Erika, scanning the plain walls, the rug on the floor that his mother had decided was too old to remain in the house.

He's known Erika for five years, since she moved to town when he was eleven and she was almost twelve. He is fairly certain he's been in love with her almost that long. She's not very nice, and she's prickly and sensitive as all get-out, and he doesn't half-understand her, and she's the best friend he's ever had, and he's never said a word to her about it but he's sure she's always known. He's never dared to check, though, since he didn't really want to know the answer. 

He can feel Erika moving forward a bit on the couch.

"What about me?" Charles says, folding his hands carefully in his lap.

"About how I wanted to punch you in the face," Erika says softly, and Charles blinks in surprise and turns back toward her.

Erika is biting her lip, still looking pissed at the world. "I kept thinking about you going to the stupid winter dance with Gabby Haller, and I just -- wanted to hit you. And her. But mostly you. It's so _stupid_ , Charles, I don't even know, it's just... She's not that pretty, or that smart, and she's not even a mutant."

Charles has no idea what to say to any of this.

"And the more I thought about you with her, the angrier I got. And then I heard you kissed Logan at Alex's party before you left--"

"That was a dare," Charles interjects quickly, though he's embarrassed by it immediately afterward. It's true, for whatever that's worth, and it's not like he's interested in Logan that way, but he sounds so kneejerk defensive about the idea, when really he's not even sure he's completely straight. 

Erika ignores his input, though, continuing on, "--and that made angry, too, and the whole thing is just... it's been driving me crazy the last couple weeks." 

Charles's impulse is to apologize, but that's utterly ridiculous; he hasn't done a single thing wrong. "I mean," he starts, a little awkwardly, fidgeting in his seat, "none of that has anything to do with you."

The glare Erika gives him could cut glass. 

"What?" Charles says.

"I don't want you kissing people," Erika says, slowly, as if Charles is being particularly thick. 

Charles is starting to get a bit angry, too. "What-- what is that supposed to mean?" he says. "You can't just say things like that--"

Erika makes a frustrated noise in the back of her throat, and, kneeling up on the cushion, pulls her sweatshirt over her head. 

Charles goes silent immediately.

She's not wearing anything underneath, not a t-shirt, not even a bra. It's a sight Charles has imagined a thousand times or more, even with all the work he's put into trying _not_ to think about Erika that way. Her skin's paler than he imagined it (but of course, it's winter, too), and she looks even skinnier without clothes covering her, the bones of her ribcage visible. Her breasts are small but lovely, with large brown aureole and little pink nipples that point slightly to the side. Charles can't look away.

There are a lot of thoughts that seem to be going through Charles's head, all at the same time. That this has to be a dream, for example. That this is too amazing to be real. Or that maybe it _isn't_ real, that Erika is doing this for some stupid reason, and not because she really wants him like he always has her -- maybe he's pressured her somehow, without even knowing it, through his powers. Can he do that? Is that a thing? Is he supposed to say no and prove he's a good person, like some kind of weird test from the universe?

He's still staring, though, and he still hasn't said anything, and he can hear the impatience in Erika's head -- and even more, hidden behind that, her embarrassment and nervousness. Erika hides those things better than anyone; Charles doesn't think anybody but him ever gets to see them. 

It occurs to him, all at once, that Erika will never forgive him if he says the wrong thing right now, and, further, that if he were to turn her down, she'd probably be humiliated and never speak to him again.

Charles raises his eyes away from her chest until he's meeting her gaze, which is frank and surprisingly open. "You're so pretty," he tells her, and even to his own ears he sounds ridiculously earnest.

Erika huffs out a soft laugh, and when Charles tentatively offers her his hand, she lets him draw her in close to him. He kisses her carefully, gently, and she responds equally softly. Charles isn't certain, but he thinks this is probably her first kiss. He lets his hand rest on the small of her back; after a while he can feel the tension start to ease out of her muscles, as she starts to relax and get more comfortable, pushing Charles's slow pace and dragging them deeper and deeper.

It's a few minutes later that Erika pulls away, removing the warmth and weight of her body completely from Charles. Charles feels a little dazed from the kissing, and he just looks at her a little stupidly until she reaches to tug on the hem of his jumper. 

"Your sweater's a little itchy," Erika says, raising an eyebrow.

"Oh," Charles says, getting the hint, and he scrambles to pull it off and throw it onto the floor beside the sofa.

This time, Erika climbs on top of him, straddling his lap. He places his hands on her waist to steady her; when she sits back, he knows she has to feel the bulge of his erection through both their jeans, but she doesn't say anything, just tilts her head down to kiss him again. 

Everything seems to go blurry after that, all mouths and tongue and heat, and Charles isn't really sure how much time has passed. It's only the feeling of his button coming undone, and then the slow tooth-by-tooth pull of his zipper, that bring him back to himself.

"Hey," he gasps out, against the sweaty column of Erika's neck, "wait a second."

Erika's hands are both on his shoulders, bracing herself there as she rubs the seam of her jeans down against Charles's thigh, but she stops both the motion of her body and the use of her powers at Charles's words. "You don't want to?" she says, and it's comforting that she sounds just as breathless as Charles does.

"It's not that," Charles says, aiming the words at Erika's perfect shoulder. "We're just going really fast, and we haven't really talked." It's farther, actually, than Charles has ever gone with anybody; before this, the furthest reaches of his sexual experiences were weekly make-out sessions with Emma Frost last spring when they were lab partners and studied at her house, and those never went beyond some light above-the-waist petting.

"You want to _talk_?" Erika's disbelief echoes in both her voice and her mind.

Charles sighs inwardly and presses a final kiss to her skin before moving his head to an angle where he can look her in the eye. She's scowling down at him and it's unfair, he thinks, that even that looks so irresistibly gorgeous on her. 

"I kinda do, yeah," he says quietly. "Or at least, I want to know what's happening."

Erika says, "I should think that's obvious," in a rather caustic voice, the kind that might be hurtful if Charles didn't know it was covering up fear.

"You know what I mean."

Erika sighs and rearranges herself a little, settling her head against Charles's shoulder. "Can't we just..."

Charles waits for her to continue, running his hands up and down her back.

"I told you," Erika says after a minute. "I don't want you kissing anybody else."

"But you want me kissing you?" Charles says, carefully. He's not trying to push -- there's nothing he wants less than to spook Erika away -- but this is, she is, too important to him to not know exactly what the rules are here.

Another sigh from her. "I have to keep my grades up if I have any chance of a scholarship, and then there's swim team, and journalism, and my dad, and I just -- I'm not good at people, anyway, you know that. But you are, everybody likes you, everything's easy for you--"

"You know that's not true," Charles interrupts, but she just pokes him in the arm with her sharp bony finger and talks over him.

"--And it's not fair, and I just ... want you all to myself." More quietly, she repeats, "I just want you."

He doesn't say anything, but he folds his arms around her, as tightly as he can.

"You're not going to get all sappy on me now, Xavier, are you?" Erika whispers in his ear.

"Never," Charles lies, and then he distracts her long enough to manage to get her on her back, lying across the couch, and then he's too busy with her nipple in his mouth to declare his undying devotion and love for her, anyway.


	22. once a dragon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Content notes: Erik is a dragon trapped in a human body; prison; vague references to torture or experiments. For the half-a-sentence meme.

Charles said, "Erik, I can't believe they're keeping you in these conditions!"

He paced from one end of the small, damp cell to the other. Erik sat on the cot, his back against the wall and his legs folded in front of him. His entire body was still except for his eyes, which tracked Charles

"I don’t know what you expected," Erik said, sounding almost curious. "They’re humans, after all."

Charles quit his pacing, coming to a stop before Erik’s cot. What _had_ he expected? He had thought - well, he had thought Erik was dying, for one thing, and possibly insane, for another. It had sounded crazy, the ramblings of the skinny, naked man he’d found lying on the side of the road past the outskirts of the city. Who had ever heard of a dragon being turned into a man? Charles was a scholar of the intersection of magic and biology; if anyone would have known about it, surely it would have been him. But there was a first time for everything, it would seem; Erik was one of a kind, and perhaps that was his curse.

He had thought the government would _help_ him. Not detain him. Not imprison him, like this, locking him away like a criminal or a terrorist, to study in their back rooms. If Charles wasn’t as rich as he was, wasn’t as well-known in certain circles, if he didn’t have the ability to make noise or trouble like he did… Erik would have disappeared already, he suspected. As it was, at least Charles could force these visits.

Out loud, he said, “You do realize that I’m a human as well?”

Erik choose not to dignify the question with a response. Instead, he reached into the pocket of his shirt (and at least that was one thing that Charles could count as a relief, that Erik had finally chosen to accept clothing, acknowledging that he needed something to make up for the lack of protection human skin awarded compared to scales) and pulled out a pack of cigarettes. He hit the pack against his hand with a motion that already looked practiced.

"Where on earth did you get that?" Charles said, wrinkling his nose.

"Sometimes, when they have questions, they bring me treasure to try and soften me up," Erik said. He looked vaguely amused by the idea, that they thought they could get to him so easily. "It’s not as good as gold, of course, or steel, but I like it. I like the smoke."

"It’s not good for you, you know. They can make you sick."

The look Erik gave him was withering. He gave Charles a second, as if to let his judgment sink in, and then continued as if Charles had never spoken. “They don’t let me keep the fire, though. It’s smart of them, I suppose. If I had that it would be much easier to kill them. Do you have fire?”

Charles sighed and sat down on the cot next to Erik. He took his lighter out of the pocket of his trousers and lit Erik’s cigarette.

Erik blew out a smoke ring, looking at practiced as if he had been smoking all this life. In a way, Charles supposed, he had.

He thought about what Erik said: _sometimes they try to soften me up_. He had a fairly good idea what they must do to Erik the other times.

"Have they been feeding you well?" Charles said abruptly. "Have you been eating?"

Erik had been thin enough when Charles had found him - whoever had done this to him had found him at his most vulnerable, still asleep and near the end of his hibernation cycle, when most of his body’s fat stores had been already depleted, and it had translated into his new form as an intense leanness. He seemed even skinnier than when Charles had seen him last, though, practically skin and bones.

"I eat," Erik said dismissively. "The meals are not good. Not enough meat, too much bread." Bread was Erik’s word for all things he considered human food, which consisted of nearly everything beyond raw or lightly cooked meat.

Charles shook his head. “We’ve talked about this. You need to eat the bread. This body has different needs than your old one.”

Erik appeared to think this over, frowning around his cigarette as he continued to smoke. “Fine,” he said after a minute. “I will do this, but only because I cannot stay this weak and still manage to kill them.”

Charles glanced around the room again. He had not yet managed to find any camera, let alone bugs, but he felt fairly certain there had to be some. Very quietly, he said, “You have to stop talking like that, too.”

Erik gazed at him directly, his eyes as clear and cold as ice. “I _will_ kill them, Charles. When I return to my body, I will take a great pleasure in watching them all burn.”

"What if you don’t ever return to your body?" Charles said, still as soft as he could, and Erik’s mouth twisted in displeasure. "Erik, listen to me, the more you talk about killing them, the more likely they are to treat you badly. Even if you do… You don’t understand what it is like nowadays, but the weapons they have - magic _and_ scientific - it’s nothing like it was before.” Dragons’ hibernation cycles varied in length, but as far as they had been able to figure out, it had probably been at least two or three hundred years since Erik had gone to sleep. It would be easy for the government to destroy him, without a second thought.

Erik hissed, and then said, “Do you think it wasn’t bad enough before? My mother died of your poisoned arrows, one lucky shot in her underbelly and months of suffering. My first hatchling - they killed her before she even had her fire. My mate took our other eggs and flew as far away as she could, as if there was somewhere safe to go. Do you think I don’t have my reasons for my hatred, Charles?”

"My friend," Charles whispered, taking Erik’s hand in his own and squeezing it tightly as if doing so would somehow convince Erik of the import of his words, "I promise you, I will get you out of this place. I will. But I need you to trust me for now."

Again, Erik gazed at him, with the same still and focused stare. It should be frightening, Charles knew, for there was something about the intelligence in Erik’s eyes that made it obvious all the ways in which he was not human, no matter how familiar his body might seem. And yet, Charles couldn’t bring himself to ever be afraid of Erik. Not Erik.

"I do trust you," Erik said. There was a weight about it, a finality, and Charles relaxed a little with relief, his grip going slack on Erik’s hand.

Erik moved his palm, closing his fingers around Charles’s wrist and turning over his arm, so the pale skin there faced upward. Charles watched, feeling a little confused and slightly dizzy, as Erik traced one of his fingers down the prominent vein of Charles’s inner arm.

"Humans," Erik said, almost as quiet now as Charles had been, "is it true humans copulate for pleasure, and not just procreation?"

"Um," Charles said. "Yes."

Erik nodded, as if satisfied, and then he leaned forward very slightly and pressed his lips to Charles’s.

It was barely a kiss, as far as these things went, just the slightest pressure and warmth of their mouths together, and it only lasted a moment, and yet it filled Charles’s head with a queer buzzing sensation.

"One of the guards mentioned this, about you and me," Erik said. "It was supposed to be an insult, I believe." Erik bared all his teeth; it took Charles a second to realize the expression was meant to be a smile. He had never seen one from Erik before. "I already knew he was a half-wit."

Charles was still sitting slack-jawed, searching for a response, when he heard the sound of the boots coming down the hall. One of the guards, then - perhaps even the same one- coming to tell him his time was up. He leaned in and kissed Erik again, very briefly, and then stood up to stand at the door to the small cell.

"I’ll be back soon," he told Erik.

Erik did not say anything, but he nodded, and Charles could still feel the weight of his eyes upon him as the guards guided him out.


	23. companionship, and the lack thereof

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Content notes: gen. For the half-a-sentence meme.

After Charles adopted the turtle, things were better, for a bit.

He started with research. He had discovered ages and ages ago that the library was the safest and most interesting room in the entire estate, so by now it was second nature to take any possible excuse to curl up in there with a pile of books.

There was not, it was true, a great deal to be found there on the care and feeding of small green turtles kidnapped from the pile of leaves out by the pond near the north border, but Charles was quite good at taking disparate and disjointed pieces of information and reading between the lines.

He made up a nest for it in his bedroom. He was fairly certain that if he were to ask permission, it would be denied, but there was no one here for him to ask, really, anyway.

It took a few weeks for the charm of his new companion to wear off. Charles had somehow assumed from all his reading that having a pet would be more … well, fulfilling, he supposed. But it wasn’t as if the turtle could respond to him, or even really listen. Its mind was so different from a person’s as to leave him unsettled and confused, even cause him a headache if he tried too hard to concentrate on it. While the turtle might be technically alive, it didn’t leave him any less lonely than a photograph on the wall might.

What he really needed, Charles thought wistfully, was a friend. Another person, someone different, like him. Surely there had to be such a person - people, even - out there. He didn’t have proof of it, but he believed it anyway. It might make him a bad scientist, but it was true.

He just had to wait, Charles told himself sternly.

And then one night, he woke up and grabbed the baseball bat beside his bed and headed down to the kitchen.


	24. bucket list

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Content notes: character with cancer.

"Erik, I just turned nineteen, and I don't want to die a virgin."

Erik glared at him from where he sat on the stoop of his mother’s house. “Shut up. You’re not going to die.”

Of all the many ways Charles had imagined Erik reacting to his declaration, ‘irritated’ hadn’t occurred to him. This was probably a fairly significant lapse on his part, Charles reflected now, considering how well he knew Erik.

"I might."

"You’re *not*."

"I think I know a little bit more about my prognosis than you do, Erik!" Charles snapped.

"Right," Erik said, still scowling, "I forgot, you know everything better than everybody, don’t you?" He reached for the pocket that held his pack of cigarettes, but stopped with his hand halfway there, shooting Charles a guilty look and taking out a piece of gum instead.

"You’re such an asshole," Charles said after a moment. "I’m baring my *heart* to you, that I want maybe one moment of pleasure before they go ahead and blast *poison* at my entire body on the off-chance it’ll kill off the bad stuff and not just the good, and you sit there too fucking stubborn to even let me give you a blowjob!"

He realized belatedly that his voice had risen steadily while he talked, until the last word was shouted fairly loudly into the air between them.

Erik stared at him. After a few seconds, the corner of his mouth twitched upward.

"You just yelled that in my mother’s garden."

"I know," Charles said. He could feel the blush rising on his cheeks.

"If the old bat next door heard you, she’s going to tell my mom, you know," Erik continued.

"I *know*," Charles repeated.

Erik gave up and laughed, the first time Charles had seen him do it since before that day in the doctor’s office. It was low and hearty and maybe a little unstable, and his hands covered his face. Charles stood awkwardly, shifting his weight from foot to foot, unsure what to say or do, until a minute had gone by, and Erik lifted his head again.

"Come here," Erik said, spreading his arms. Charles took the invitation, lowering himself down onto the hard concrete to climb into Erik’s lap, and Erik kissed him, very gently.

"We can have sex," Erik said very softly, his breath warm against Charles’s ear, "but you have to promise you won’t ever say that again."

"That I want to give you a blowjob?" Charles said. His mind was feeling fuzzy already, after just a kiss and feeling Erik’s body against his. He couldn’t imagine what it would be like when Erik was really touching him.

"No, dummy," Erik said, "that you’re going to die."

"Fine, okay," Charles said, "not a word," and he followed it up by using his mouth for something entirely, and kissing Erik again.


	25. again

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content notes: angst, time travel, post-coital road trip scene.

It wasn't, of course, as if Charles had forgotten what it was like - his memory was too precise to allow that, even after so many years - and yet! And yet. It was like the difference, he thought, between a photograph of some beautiful scenery and actually being there. There was no comparison, none at all.

Charles's face was still buried against the skin of Erik's shoulder; his teeth would make a mark, he thought. The sweat was rapidly cooling along his body, and Erik's too. He could feel Erik press a kiss against the matted mess of Charles's hair, and then Erik's hands were tugging lightly, urging Charles to move.

Charles groaned in protest, but he pushed himself up on his elbows, separating their slick chests. Another movement, and he was rolling off of Erik completely to collapse onto his stomach on the mattress beside him.

Erik stroked his hand down the length of Charles's spine, ending with a delicate pat of Charles's ass. If he were less satiated, Charles would have wiggled it in response, but as it was, he felt too pleasantly lazy to bother. Instead he turned his head from the pillow to watch as Erik rose from the bed to stand, and stretch.

It was unearthly, Charles mused, how beautiful Erik was. Had he appreciated that the first time around? Could he have? Surely not the way he did now.

"Look at you," Charles murmured, "you're perfect."

Erik glanced over his shoulder, one eyebrow raised. "You already got me into bed, Charles. Surely the time for sweet talk has passed."

"Poppycock," Charles said, enunciating as clearly as he could, but it merely caused the corners of Erik's mouth to curl up in amusement.

"If I didn't know better, I'd think you'd been drinking," Erik said.

The door to the bathroom was open, and Erik didn't bother to pull on clothes before he walked in, nor close the door once he got there. He stood over the sink and turned the faucet with a flick of his fingers into the air, before leaning over and splashing some cold water onto his face. A few second later, he filled up the tumbler on the edge, and downed the entire glass in one go, his adam's apple bouncing enticingly as he swallowed it down.

Charles's thighs were absolutely aching from riding Erik so enthusiastically. He was sore now, and he'd be sore tomorrow, but it was a sort of ache he hadn't felt in decades, so he felt thoroughly satisfied about it. The post-orgasm endorphins didn't hurt anything either, he had to admit.

He turned his head away from watching the way each of Erik's movements exposed new and fascinating elements of his nudity, and instead reached toward the nightstand. He wasn't consciously thinking; it was only when the cigarettes and lighter were already in his hand that he realized what he was doing.

That was the danger of muscle memory, he supposed. Of course this body took it for granted that there would be a post-coital fag; there always had been, after all. The casual sex had stopped with Erik, months from now; the few other times he smoked, not until the surgeon general's report, still over a year away.

Charles stared at the cigarettes longingly. Really, he thought, in a way, he already smoked them all, didn't he? It was already done, so it wasn't any worse for him to do it again. They had been gone for years now.

He knew exactly how weak the justification was even as he thought it. But if he were really so concerned with danger - Erik was a hundred, thousand, million times worse than any cigarette could ever be. And god knew Charles hadn't hesitated a single moment with him. He had woken up in this place and time and had gone full speed ahead without a second thought. Wasn't that was a second chance? To get to do it over again? Or to do it completely differently?

"Trade you," Erik said, and Charles looked over as he climbed back onto the bed, a washcloth in one hand.

"Sounds fair," Charles agreed. He took two cigarettes in his mouth at once, lighting them together, before handing one over to Erik, who took it almost daintily between his two fingers and dropped the warm, wet cloth onto the bed between them.

Charles adjusted his position so he could wipe off the sticky remains of their lovemaking off his stomach, chest and legs. Once he was clean, the linen beneath him still felt unpleasantly grungy in comparison, so he nudged Erik with his thigh until he scooted over and made more room; and then he curled up, head against Erik's chest, legs intertwined - muscle memory, again, he thought, that made this so comfortable, so peaceful as they lay in silence, smoking.

Eventually Erik pushed himself up a bit, stretching to put out his butt in the ashtray next to his lamp, and Charles handed him his, to do the same. When Erik lay down again, his hands pulled and pushed on Charles again, until they were stretched out together the length of their bodies, back to front, with Erik's nose against Charles's hair.

Charles hadn't forgotten this either, precisely - how much Erik touched him, how tightly he held on. He had merely chosen not to think about it, more often than he had to.

He wondered what the rest of the night would be like - if Erik would wake him up in a few hours for another round, perhaps. Or wake him up, less pleasantly and less intentionally, with the loudness of his mind's dark dreams. Or maybe it would be one of those nights when they both slept peacefully, the whole night through.

There was no way to know, Charles thought. If there was one thing he should know, it should be what would happen next, and thus where to go from here. But, in spite of everything, he didn't feel very certain about that at all.

Erik was already asleep, snoring almost imperceptibly softly behind him, and his hand was spread, light but possessive, across Charles's stomach.

Charles rest his own hand atop Erik's, and stopped resisting the pull of sleep upon his body.


	26. open door

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> pocky_slash and I gave each other a challenge a while back to write something about Erik's kids, running away to the mansion for comfort from Charles, the best/worst stepdad ever, whenever they wanted. Pocky_slash's version ended up growing to be the totally amazing [write this number down (you can call it anytime)](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1164728); mine was this tiny ficlet.

Charles is never certain what to expect when Erik comes - and Erik does come, always, travelling to the mansion himself each time to retrieve his children. Of course, that's a good part of why the twins run away in the first place; for all that Erik is a very intelligent man, Charles wonders that he has never seemed to grasp, any more than the children themselves do, how much of their displeasure is merely a craving for his focused attention. It happens on a semi-regular basis now, once or twice a year that Charles finds them, once again approaching the mansion.

Sometimes when Erik comes to get them, he's simmering with anger - self-directed, perhaps, but aimed at Charles, for lack of a better target. Charles has a particularly clear memory of a bristling Erik, voice utterly even and controlled, accusing Charles of trying to turn his children against him. Unfair, in any number of ways: Charles has yet to utter a single word of criticism or negativity towards Erik in front of either child. He sits with them in the school's kitchen, lets them stay up late into the night eating cookies and ice cream - indulges their every wish, more or less, the way he restrains himself from ever doing with any of his students. He lets them talk as much as they need to, and he listens to everything they have to say, and in response he tells them: _Your father loves you very much. More than anything. He's just not very good at showing it_ and _Everything he does, he does with you two in mind; to build a world where you can grow up free to fear and intolerance for who you are_.

It's not always anger, though. Erik is too complex for that, just as he's always been too complex for any easy answers. Sometimes he says thank you, instead. "I know they're safe here, with you," he said once, standing next to Charles as they both gazed on the children, asleep against each other on a couch. "As safe as they could be anywhere else."

Charles can remember, from the days when Erik still allowed Charles access to his mind, the great burning void that was Erik's lost yearning and longing for family. He doesn't take for granted the measure of trust that Erik will admit to him. Charles would never turn away _any_ mutant in need, of course, but there is perhaps something special, something warmer, in the care he takes with the twins. Caring for them _for_ Erik; holding on to them in his stead.

(And if he wants, _needs_ , for them to love him, too... Well. So it goes. Charles knows himself very well, after all, his strengths and his limitations both.)

He tells Erik that the children will always have a welcome here if they need one. If the words _as will you_ go unsaid, they do not go unthought.


	27. Awakening

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content notes: post-Days of Future Past, amnesia trope.

Erik wakes aching and groggy, and with a nagging sensation he's missed something.

It's not a feeling he's used to. He's trained his body to be under his complete control at any given moment, in sleep as well as anywhere else. He doesn't sleep in, doesn't lose track of himsef. This... feels wrong.

It's possible he was drugged, though he can't imagine how. Still, the theory is given some weight as he drifts further into awareness and notices the metal in the shape of a wheelchair across the room. His reflexes are working, at least, because he's called the remaining free metal to him before his eyes are even all the way open. No knives, no guns or other weapons, not even his damned coin - just a remarkably ugly ashtray.

Well, he's done more with less.

The room's dim, with all the curtains shutting out the light, but not so dark that Erik can't easily make out the man in the wheelchair, though he hasn't taken in much more detail than a trimmed beard and dark hair pulled back in a ponytail before the man speaks.

"Do you know, I had rather forgotten how unpleasant you could be upon waking." English, then, not the German Erik was vaguely expecting. A British accent, warm and cultured in tone, with at least a hint of sarcasm.

Erik stares at him, speechless with surprise and suspicion.

"You truly don't remember me at _all_ ," the man continues after a moment, a hint of wonder in his voice. "Raven warned me, of course, but I suppose I thought... Hmm. Rather stings, I must admit."

"Should I know you?" Erik replies sharply.

The man smiles. Erik can't read the expression. "Do put down that silly ashtray, I'm not going to let you hurt anybody." He rolls his eyes when Erik merely tightens his grip. "Look, Erik, before you make any particularly stupid decisions, perhaps you could consider letting me fill you in on a few items."

"Like what?" Erik says. When he attempts to sit up, the movement jogs something, and the pain in his head seems to increase tenfold, piercing and sharp, radiating out from behind one ear. Not just drugs, then; he's injured somehow.

"Well," the man in the wheelchair says, "to begin with, that meeting in Amsterdam you're so worried about missing - it's over already. He didn't have any useful information for you about Schmidt, but he _did_ give you that scar on your left pinkie to remember him by."

"How do you--" Erik starts, anger and confusion mixed together. He doesn't know why he hasn't attacked yet, what's holding him back. It can't just be the dizziness.

"More importantly," the man says, talking over him, "the year is 1974. Schmidt is dead. You killed him a dozen years ago."

The words are so inherently ridiculous, so far from anything Erik was expecting to hear that he doesn't know how to process them. He resorts, once again, to anger. There's some kind of game being played here, and he doesn't recognize it and he doesn't like it. He doesn't like how much information this stranger seems to have on him, either, and it's that he clings to.

"Who the hell are you?" he demands, forcing himself up to sit now despite his body's objections, reaching out his power to shake the body of the wheelchair, subtle but clearly threatening.

That same knowing and unreadable smile, the one Erik's already coming to hate. "I could answer that any number of ways, but I suppose the one that would mean the most to you right now... I'm the one who helped you kill him."


	28. More three-sentence AUs

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 3 sentences (or, some, a bit longer) AUs, written for prompts on tumblr.

**Charles/Erik, maze**

"No, I’ve read about this before," Charles says, "the trick is to just keep turning left, and eventually we’ll make our way out—"

"Charles," Erik says, in a flat voice that obviously is covering amusement. When Charles turns to him, he’s hovering a few inches above the ground, arms spread on either side..

"Or we could do it your way, I suppose," Charles allows. "…Show off."

 

**Charles/Erik, space**

Erik has chores directly after lessons finish; he’s on childcare duty for this cycle, helping with the babies and toddlers in the nursery (not his favorite assignment, but better than janitorial service, at least) and as a bonus, today his superior lets him go early for once.

He has Charles’s schedule memorized, of course, just as Charles has his, and it’s still Charles’s free period, which means there’s really only one place he’ll be.

Erik finds Charles, as expected, curled up in a corner of the archives, eyes glazed as he watches some filmchip. Erik can’t see or hear it, but he can easily guess what it’s about: yet another drama or documentary about the days of old Earth. Erik can’t see the appeal, himself - neither he nor Charles has ever seen Earth, born onto this ship just like their parents were, and their grandparents before that, just like their children and grandchildren will be, until the ship finally reaches its destination planet. What’s the point of looking backwards, to something you’ll never know?

Charles, Erik says, because he knows he’ll get Charles’s attention quicker that way than trying to physically rouse him - and sure enough, Charles blinks away his film a moment later, focusing in on Erik and giving him a broad grin.

"Hi!" Charles starts, but they really don’t have very much time before Charles’s chore period and Erik’s meal period start, and it’s not too often they get any precious private time on this ship, so Erik interrupts whatever he’s going to say with a firm kiss, pulling Charles in close. 

Charles doesn’t seem to mind.

 

**Charles/Erik, HS AU, spin the bottle**

Charles has to search through most of the house, but he finally finds Erik outside on the back porch, stubbing out half-smoked cigarettes into Moira’s mother’s flower beds.

"Come inside," Charles says, "some of the others want to play spin the bottle, we need you."

Erik looks up and away from the lighter he’s been playing with idly and gives Charles an odd look. “So? It’s a dumb game. Why do you even want me there? Another person will just lessen your odds with Moira or Emma.”

You complete idiot, Charles thinks, but out loud he says, “Yeah, but you’ll also lessen my odds of getting Hank or Sean,” and when he reaches out and wraps his fingers around Erik’s wrist, Erik lets him lead them back inside.

 

**Charles/Erik, turkeys**

"Stay," Charles said, trying once more, "stay here, with us, you’ve made a life here—"

"You’ve always known my plans," Erik said, fluttering his wings angrily; it had been a nearly a year since his family had been killed, taken away to be slaughtered and fed at the humans’ tables, only Erik spared. He had wandered alone for some time before he had come across this sanctuary, Charles and his companions living in peace and harmony far away from the humans — but as comfortable and sweet as these months have been, Erik had not dared let himself lose track of the ultimate goal of his revenge.

 

**Charles/Erik, Someone decides to make a cake, but is typically a terrible cook, and it turns out to be miraculously good. The other is skeptical about what was sacrificed for such deliciousness!**

This is good," Erik says after a bite of cake, with a brief flash of surprise in his eyes. "Give my compliments to Raven."

"I will not," Charles announces, stealing a bite from Erik’s plate himself, "as she had no part in making it."

Erik gives him a skeptical look. “Don’t try and tell me *you* made this. The only edible things I’ve ever seen you prepare are beans on toast and hot cocoa. And the hot cocoa was more brandy than chocolate.”

"It was delicious, though, wasn’t it?" Charles points out, but Erik merely shakes his head in lieu of a response, though he does help himself to another slice.

 

**teen!Erik/older!Charles**

"You shouldn’t be here," Charles murmurs, but he doesn’t push Erik away when Erik comes closer, pressing their bodies together so Erik can feel it when Charles breathes in deeply, can smell and almost taste the liquor heavy on Charles’s breath, feel the way Charles quivers a little, not unaffected at all.

 

Charles is shorter than him by a handful of inches, which seems almost backwards somehow - Charles’s head tilted up toward him, looking up at him as if Erik is the adult of the two of them, the one who is experienced and jaded and mature. It makes it easier, in a way, to pretend this isn’t a little frightening, going in as if this wasn’t his first kiss, as if he knows what he’s doing, as if he seduces older men every day.

 

**Charles/Erik - meeting as teenagers on their respective family vacations**

Mama and Papa had left for their anniversary dinner, dressed up in their best clothes, laughing and seeming to forget Erik was there even before they were out of the room. Erik had expected to feel relieved to have the hotel suite to himself, after so much time in their company the last few days, but he felt a little lonely, a little left out, instead, sitting there flipping through the hotel cable, and after a few minutes he decided to head down to the pool.

The pool was almost empty, only one other person there - it was another boy, about Erik’s own age, floating on his back in one corner; he flashed Erik a bright smile, which Erik ignored as he slipped into the pool and began his laps. He could feel the boy’s eyes on him as he swam.

 

**Charles/Erik, bike culture AU, Erik is one of those TAKE BACK THE ROAD guys and Charles is trying to hide his car (even though it IS a hybrid).**

"Our first date is this weekend, after he gets off work on Saturday," Charles tells Raven, eyes going soft and a little dreamy - it worries Raven a little, that he seems to be this far gone on this new guy already, but that’s what Charles is like, all his chips in every time, no matter how bad an idea it might, and he’s never going to listen to her or thank her for warning him. "We’re going to bike all the way out of the city and then up the mountain trail and have a picnic up there. Doesn’t that sound amazing?"

Raven shrugs. “I guess, but wouldn’t it be easier to just drive there?”

Charles looks away, a flash of something almost like guilt on his face. “Well…” Charles says, “it turns out Erik has something of a philosophical opposition to automobiles.”

Raven stares at him until a flush starts to creep up Charles’s face. “Let me guess,” she says dryly, “he somehow got the impression that you have one as well?”

Charles’s silence is telling.

 

**Charles/Erik, in the produce section of the grocery store**

Another one of those minor quotidian irritants that never seem to go away: the beets are too far up for Charles to reach from his chair. Erik, he calls, would you mind…

Erik looks up from where he’s inspecting the apple selections a few feet away, frowning. “These apples are twice the price of the ones across the aisle,” he complains.

"That’s because they’re organic, darling. Not totally covered with pesticides."

Erik makes a hmmph noise. Waste of money. He comes over and picks up a bunch of beets and places them in a plastic bag before handing it down to Charles. “Why are we getting these? They taste like dirt.”

"They’re very healthy," Charles responds, and Erik makes another face, one that Charles thinks is more appropriate for a small child than a grown man.

"As long as you’re not getting more beans," Erik says darkly. "I’ve eaten enough beans to last me the rest of my life, and I’m not doing it again unless I absolutely have to."

"If you had your way, all we’d eat would be steak and chocolate, and you’d be dead of a heart attack within five years," Charles says severely. "Now come on, and help me choose what kind of chicken sausages we should get."

 

**Raven and Charles and a garden party.**

"Come out," Charles says to the closet door, for perhaps the fifth time. "You’re being silly."

"No." Raven’s voice is strained; Charles knows she’s trying not to cry. "There are too many people out there. They’re all going to know I don’t belong here."

"They won’t. I promise." Charles rests his forehead against the wood of the door. "It’ll be just like it was when you met Mother. Nobody will know you weren’t always here with me. And it’ll be fun, I promise. There’s lemonade and all sorts of cookies and cakes, and Mother will only want us around for a little while anyway, and then we can go play out by the woods, okay? Trust me, Raven. I’ll take care of you."

He can hear Raven sniff, but she opens the closet door anyway, giving him a weak smile to match her watery eyes. “I do trust you,” she says solemnly, before looking down at herself. “I don’t suppose you can do anything about all these ruffles and ribbons on this dress?”

 

**Charles/Erik, railway station?**

"You didn’t have to come and meet me," Charles says, though Erik can tell by the crinkle in his eyes how pleased he is.

"Maybe I didn’t come to meet you," Erik suggests. "Maybe I just like the trains. All that metal…" He waves a hand around, seemingly casual.

Charles quirks an eyebrow. “Maybe,” he allows, but he pushes himself up on his toes to meet Erik in a kiss. When he comes down again, he shoves his bag into Erik’s arms and gives him a winning smile. “Now, where have you parked the car?”


	29. Without blinking

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A first meeting, after DOFP.

Erik very nearly turns back when he reaches the grounds. But it's a foolish whim, and he bats it away almost immediately. He's already come this far, and he's not one to waste his time. Nor does he consider himself a coward.

He also does not consider himself a man of sentiment. Whatever attachment he had to this estate were a few weeks, effectively a lifetime ago. It's merely another place.

He can sense the particular configuration of metal that makes up a wheelchair, in a room in the ground floor along the south side of the mansion, and he glides steadily in that direction, landing softly just outside the closed french doors.

Erik does pause, then. Not hesitation; merely a pause, to consider his options.

_Stop dithering and come in already. I've been expecting you._

Charles's voice, even and mildly impatient, in his head. It's been a long time. Erik opens the doors and enters the room.

It's a study, cleaner and less busy than the crammed Victorian aesthetic Erik remembers dominating the house. Charles is seated behind a wide, imposing desk, writing on a pad of paper - though he sets this down as Erik comes closer, wheeling himself around to meet him halfway.

"I've known you were coming as long as you have yourself, I expect. I do keep an extra mental watch out these days, you know," Charles says, continuing out loud as if they were in the midst of a conversation. He looks markedly better than the last time Erik saw him. If his hair is still too long, it's pulled back neatly into a ponytail, and he's clean-shaven. He looks five years younger, at least. "I won't allow any threats to come near the school. Not without my knowledge."

Erik can't help but bristle at the implications of this, though he pushes down the irritation as best he can. He didn't come here to fight. He restrains himself to a simple, "I'm not your enemy, Charles."

Charles looks him over for what seems to Erik to be a very long time. His eyes are clear and bright - another change for the better, in Erik's opinion - and his gaze is steady and calm. Eventually he appears to make a decision and says, "I'd like to think that's true, Erik. I do have others to look out for, though, you realize. Innocents in my care."

"I would never harm one of your students," Erik says. He's never been anything but honest with Charles, though, in his own way, and it's that honesty that compels him to add now, "Not unless it was absolutely necessary."

To his confusion, it gains him a smile. A quick one, a brief flash of amusement that curls Charles's lips. "Our definitions of necessity have always differed, Erik. That's the problem."

None of this visit is going the way Erik expected - though he had tried to not have any expectations at all. Still, he would have been less surprised, he thinks, if Charles had greeted him with another punch to the face.

"Yes, well," Charles says neutrally, responding to the unspoken words, "the night's still young."

He turns, and Erik follows him across the room. There's a chessboard set up in the corner, a bottle of Scotch and two glasses on the table beside it. Charles stops by white and waits as Erik settles himself into the chair opposite.

Erik stares down at the pieces, frowning, as Charles makes his first move.

"Charles," he finally manages, looking up, "I just wanted to say--"

"Please don't," Charles says. He is staring at the board as well, and there is a strain visible in his face for the first time, which Erik finds obscurely comforting. It's good to remember that things aren't easy for Charles, that the all-knowing and wise facade is still an act, however good he may be at playing it. "Let's just play. Let's not talk tonight." He extends his hand, stroking a finger down the line of his king. He adds slowly, "There'll be time for that later, yeah?"

Erik nods, and then he reaches out and makes his move.


	30. expectations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On one of his visits to Charles, Erik encounters a stranger.

The third floor of the east wing of the house is set aside for Charles's private quarters. This means it is off-limits for students; not unrelatedly, it is the only part of the mansion that Erik has permission to set foot in.

It is therefore surprising to land on the patio one evening, gesture wide the French doors that open up to the small cozy parlor that lies off of Charles's bedroom, and walk in to find the room occupied, not by Charles, but by a small boy.

The boy (obviously mutant: while Erik would assume as much for any child in the dwelling, it is beyond doubt by the rich deep blue of his skin) is curled up on the couch, Charles's old shoddy afghan wrapped around him. His hands are cupped around a mug. He looks every bit as surprised as Erik feels, which is probably to his credit.

While the boy is still blinking, wide-eyed, at him, Erik says, "What are you doing here?"

It is possible his voice comes out rather more intimidating than he is intending, but there's no point in worrying about it. 

"I--" the boy says, still looking startled and confused. "My uncle--"

The chess set Charles and Erik usually play at is put away somewhere; Erik can't see it anywhere. Instead, a game of Parchisi seems to be paused halfway through play on the coffee table near the couch. Erik frowns.

"Where is Charles?"

"He is called away," the boy says, finally managing a full sentence. His voice is thickly accented: German. It's been... years, quite a few years, since Erik spoke his first language with another person. "Hank was needing a-- an opinion," the boy continues.

"Of course he was," Erik mutters.

He looks the boy over again. He ups his estimate of the boy's age by a few years; not so young, merely rather scrawny. He thinks he notices a tail poking through two of the knots of the blanket.

"Well," Erik says, making up his mind. He sits down in the armchair he thinks of as his own (he is, as far as he knows, the only one who ever uses it), and faces the boy square on, leaning forward and letting his clasped hands hang between his legs. In the boy's own language he says, "Tell me about yourself. What is your name? How did you come to be in this place?"

The boy gives him a doubtful look, sets down his mug, and then -- in the space between one blink and another -- he's gone.

A teleporter, then. Hmm.

Erik takes off his helmet, settling it on the coffee table, careful not to disrupt the game in progress. He picks up the abandoned mug and sniffs once -- yes, hot chocolate, doubtlessly made on Charles's beloved hot plate -- and swallows the remainder while he waits for Charles to contact him. 

He doesn't wait long.

_You ass_ , Charles's voice proclaims into his head, a minute later. _You've scared the poor lad half to death._

_I was perfectly polite._

_You were strange and looming and curious and everything his mother has warned him about his entire life_ , Charles snaps back.

_His mother being Mystique, I take it?_ Erik says. He rather wishes he had a drink, but he's not about to go rummaging through Charles's drawers and shelves for the liquor. He's a guest. Well, in a manner of speaking.

There's a pause before Charles speaks to him again, his thoughts a bit quieter and more subdued. _Did you know about him, then? Did she ever tell you?_

_No_ , Erik says, equally thoughtful. _No, this is a surprise._

_It was for me as well_ , Charles says, and there's something in his tone that's both rueful and kind. Of all the things he and Charles have ever had in common, perhaps that's among the most unexpected: Mystique's secrets, and the way she enforces the boundaries she holds between them.

Charles continues, _I’ll be at least a half hour. I trust you can entertain yourself until then._

Erik can, and will. The book he was reading upon his last visit is still upon the same shelf, bookmark still at his place. He settles into his chair and puts up his feet, letting the storm of questions in his mind settle and wait for Charles to appear, preferably on his own.


	31. long distance phone call

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Erik, post-DOFP good future.

"Logan's back," Charles says, the first thing after they've gone through the requisite greetings and assurances that they've each been missed in the hours since their last phone call.

Erik grunts, not particularly interested in the news. Usually Charles leads with an update on how Erik's dog is doing with his master away, or at least an interesting or amusing anecdote involving one of the children.

"I didn't know he was gone," Erik replies.

"No," Charles says, "he's _back_. From the past."

Erik has been away on this trip for ten days; he is not due to return to Westchester for another week. Of course this is when things would go to hell.

(Charles would argue with this, if Erik were to say it aloud. Charles insist the school ran perfectly well for years without Erik and would run perfectly well without him again. The words "boy toy" may have left his mouth more than once. Erik chooses to gracefully ignore this, as he does so many things.)

There is a nine hour time difference between New York and Genosha, which typically means that when Charles calls at night, just after he's gotten in bed, Erik is just beginning his day. Normally he gloats inwardly a bit as he stares off into the beautiful tropical sunrise outside his hotel window, but this morning he can't help scowling out at it instead.

"Stop pouting," Charles says. 

"I know your range perfectly well," Erik says. "You can't read my mind from this far away."

Charles's laugh is distant and faintly tinny through the phone. He has Erik on speakerphone again, which is always irritating. "As though I need to."

"I suppose the two of you had a splendid time, reminiscing together on days gone by."

"He was a good friend to me when I very badly needed one," Charles says. His voice is gentle but nevertheless Erik can sense a slight bite to it.

Erik merely sniffs in response. The past is past. There's very little of the 1970s - or of the 1980s, for that matter - that he would have any interest in reliving. 

"How nice for you," Erik finally manages, which is as polite and civil he can force himself to be about a man he doesn't care for bringing up a period in his and Charles's relationship he would prefer to leave well enough alone. 

Still, Charles seems to take it in the spirit of conciliation in which Erik vaguely intends it, and lets the subject go in favor of filling Erik in on his meeting today with Jean and Scott, and then onwards to the latest on the dog, and eventually (just as Charles is very nearly ready to fall asleep) some rather sweeter and more private words, all of which leaves Erik in a much better mood as the call comes to a close, with a renewed appetite for his breakfast and the vigor to face the busy day before him.


	32. another hotel room, another night

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Set during mutant recruit road trip in XMFC.

Erik's pulse is racing, a too-quick strum under the skin where Charles presses his lips gently against his throat. That in itself is not necessarily a bad sign, but the way Erik's body has gone stiff and tense, the way his mind has gone blank and hidden - those are less ambiguous signals.

Jumping away would make it worse, Charles reflects, a hasty retreat only emphasizing the awkwardness. He stays close, then, though no longer touching. The smell of Erik's cologne is mixed with sweat, spicy and strong, and Charles can't help but breathe it in when he inhales, staring forward at Erik's shoulder.

"I thought--" No, it doesn't matter what he thought. What he *knew*, really, because he doesn't truly think he mistook Erik's thoughts. Not about this. But what people think doesn't always translate into action, and he should know that by now; it's a lesson he's had to learn enough times. "I won't push."

"You will, though," Erik says, and Charles blinks in surprise, looking up to meet Erik's eyes. Erik's gaze is fixed on him, unblinking and serious. "You live to push, Charles."

It's not precisely a flattering assessment, but it doesn't seem as though Erik means it as a criticism. Charles does take a step back, now, and Erik's jaw twitches as he does.

"The last thing I want to do is make you uncomfortable. You don't have to worry."

"Don't be stupid. I'm more comfortable with you than I've ever been with another person," Erik says dismissively. "That's not--"

He cuts himself off, shaking his head. 

Charles is confused, and impatient as well, though he forces himself to bite his lip and not press Erik further. After a moment Erik continues.

"You know what I am. You know my past," Erik says, voice slow and thick. "People who are close to me get hurt."

There are flames in Erik's memories, and screams. All the sweet moments are too quiet to push their way forward and compete. It's possible Charles has never loved another person like he does this moment, with his heart aching and heavy in his chest.

"It's different," Charles says, once he thinks he's able to speak again. "There are no secrets between us. I can see you exactly as you are, Erik."

"So you keep insisting," Erik says. There's uncertainty in his eyes, and Charles realizes: Erik wants to believe him. He wants it very badly.

He reaches out, into the space between them, and takes Erik's hand in his own.

"Let's don't worry about it tonight, hm?" Charles says, and after another long moment of carefully watching him, Erik nods.

They don't kiss that night, but they sleep together in the same narrow hotel bed, skin against skin like the oldest and most natural form of comfort Charles can imagine. 

They dream the same dream, and in the morning, when Charles wakes, he doesn't know which of them it truly belonged to.


	33. burn it out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> XMFC, Erik backstory. Content notes: Erik's terrible childhood/adolescence.

Erik is fourteen years old the first time he kills a man.

He doesn't realize what he's done at the time, too caught up in the all-consuming pain and fury that envelops him as his mother drops. It's only later, alone and quiet in his new cell of a room, that he thinks of it: the men, their helmets crushing their heads like ripe fruit in a fist.

He tells himself they deserved it. It's their fault his mother is dead, just as much as it is Schmidt's.

* * *

The next time he kills is almost a year later. 

There are two new scars on his abdomen and yellowing bruises up and down his back, and still he hesitates, staring down at the helpless and cowering man on the floor before him.

Schmidt's lips purse, impatient with Erik's delay. "Friedrich," he says, "why don't you tell Erik here just what you think of the Jews?"

There's a bar of chocolate included with Erik's dinner rations that night. Erik vomits it back up again almost immediately.

* * *

The first time it happens consciously, and of his own volition: he is out of the camps. He is free. But he is cold, and he is hungry -- the sort of cold and hunger that can kill, but Erik has survived so far. He will keep surviving. 

He's taken shelter in a barn. In the middle of the night, the owner comes across him, gun in hand, screaming at him in Polish.

Erik does what needs to be done.

He stops keeping count, after that.


	34. old men together at the end of the world

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Originally posted on tumblr.

Charles sleeps little these days. Less and less, it seems, as time goes on. There is too much work to do--too much work that only he _can_ do. No one else has the innate ability that would be necessary to operate their miniature Cerebro, let alone the training to do so. There's only Charles. And it is important, this, given how few tools or weapons that they have left. At least they still have some way to connect with each other, as few of them are left. At least that's something, one speck of hope to cling to.

(If nothing else, he thinks to himself, if it does no other good--at least he is there to see. To witness those few who are left. To witness all those who no longer are.)

Most of the time, when he does sleep, it is Erik who takes it upon himself to coax him to bed. Ororo and Logan make suggestions, and worry about him, but even after all that has happened they still seem to see him in a position of authority. Erik has never seen him as the Professor, never held him on a pedestal. He grumbles and snarks and calls Charles an idiot, all but orders him to sleep (his mind lit up with his own irritation at playing such an unfamiliar role, cast as caregiver or nursemaid or nagging spouse or something else equally unimaginable). 

And sometimes Charles gives in. What sleep he does obtain these days is almost always with Erik beside him.

* * *

Erik does not sleep well either, but then, he never has done, these seventy years or more. He never mastered the ability to lose himself in some idyllic dream, to free himself for some hours in rest and oblivion. His subconscious has always held on too tightly to his history. His body has always been too aware of his vulnerability to what new dangers may come.

* * *

Some nights Erik wakes up in the middle of the night and the sight of Charles asleep next to him sets his heart racing, his breath catching in his chest, panic and fear and confusion overcoming him. Charles is gone. Charles is dead. He lost Charles, years ago, this cannot be real, perhaps he’s going mad after all this time—

The strength of Erik's mental turmoil wakes Charles then, usually, and with his voice in Erik's head and his hand on Erik's shoulder, Charles talks him down gently, silently. Reminds him what is real, and what is not. What has been gained, and all that has been lost.

* * *

They rarely bother talk aloud between themselves these days. There's no need to. They spent much of their lives speaking and yet failing to communicate. Perhaps they're beyond words now. There's no need to say _You were right_ or _I love you_ or _Do you remember?_ It is all understood.

* * *

Some nights Charles wakes up and for a moment he is sure he is in his bed, at his school, about to rise for another long day teaching and guiding his children on their way. It lasts a few seconds, sometimes, before he remembers.

On those nights, he gets up and out of bed, no matter what time it is; wheels himself back over to Cerebro; and gets back to work.


	35. different lights

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> originally posted on tumblr for the prompt "when it rains/snows/storms." Post-DOFP.

They're in bed when the power goes out. 

Both of them pause, hands going still, a kiss interrupted--but the pause is not any longer than a moment, before they continue on regardless.

They've never made love with the lights out before. Not back in the beginning, on the road or in the mansion, and certainly not in these handful of times they've come together in the last few years. Charles isn't sure why, really. If he had suspected it would feel impersonal or distant, he was wrong on all counts. Not being able to see Erik's face doesn't change anything. It's still Erik, remarkable and unmistakable, touch and breath and mind all so undeniably and distinctively his and no one else's.

Normally after sex Charles likes to shower, but he stays in bed while Erik goes to seek out candles, matches, and a flashlight from the junk drawer in the kitchen where they lie next to other detritus of other summers: decks of cards, bottle openers and pieces of string. This house was originally an overly pretentious cabin for vacations out in the near-wilderness whenever the notion might strike; aside from the renovations Charles has made for the wheelchair, it's not much more now. Less fancy, if anything. It's a place of odds and ends, spares and extras from a dozen other places.

It had seemed like an apt place for this rendezvous.

Charles's pajamas are on the end table where Erik carefully laid them out when he undressed Charles earlier, piece by piece. By the time Charles has them back on, Erik's returned with his bounty. It includes, surprisingly, a bowl of ice cream, which he places in Charles's hands, before setting the candles around the room. 

"You shouldn't have opened the freezer," Charles remarks.

"Aren't we supposed to eat it before it melts?" Erik says. He sits down on the bed beside Charles again. He's still completely nude, Charles realizes, not that it matters. He takes the bowl from Charles's now chilled hands and takes a thoughtful spoonful.

If Charles were to bring ice cream to bed, he would have simply brought the carton for them to eat out of; Erik bothered to dig out china and silverware out of the cupboards in the dark. Only one spoon, however. They have to take turns. 

Charles watches Erik between spoonfuls. The candlelight is oddly unforgiving. Erik looks older like this, the shadows and darkness emphasizing the crags of his handsome face. And he looks, Charles thinks, very tired. 

The sound of the rain and wind is very loud against the windows and the roof. It has been since shortly after they arrived, but they hadn't paid any mind to it until now, too preoccupied to notice. They've done this enough now, these clandestine meetings, that Charles can say there is a pattern to it. They talk; they drink; they play chess; they go to bed. There's no hurrying it, no putting it off either. 

Charles's thoughts are interrupted by the sudden flash of lightning, brightening the room for one short moment. Erik shivers full-body and lets out a small low noise, though the thunder follows quickly enough to almost cover the sound. 

Charles wonders how it must feel, the sense of electricity through his powers, but he doesn't ask.

When the ice cream is gone, Erik takes the bowl and sets it on the side table, and they make love again.

It's still raining in the morning when Charles wakes, alone in the bed. The power is still out, but it's light enough outside to see around the house. He can sense, without having to try, that Erik is still on the property. By the time Charles has made his way to the kitchen and begun picking at the loaf of bread he bought on the ride up here and set a kettle on the stove (a gas range, thank goodness; he feels the need for a cup of tea rather keenly), he can hear Erik rattling at the front door.

Erik is rather damp, and frowning; he glares at both Charles's bread and butter and the tea kettle with what might be suspicion or perhaps resentment. "The end of the driveway is flooded," he announces. "And the phone is out as well."

Charles receives the news with equanimity, which doesn't appear to please Erik either. It's not as though Charles needs to use the telephone line to communicate with the school; they're well within his range, even out here. The standing water should have fallen enough for him to drive within a day or so, and nothing is going to fall apart back home if Hank is in charge a little longer. There's enough food here; a whole pile of old paperbacks on the shelves in the living room if he gets bored. It's been long enough since he read for pleasure.

Erik looks like he's waiting for something, and Charles narrows his eyes, watching him, as he chews meditatively on his bread. 

_Oh_ , Charles thinks, with a sudden realization and an accompanying feeling that might be irritation, or exhaustion, or perhaps something completely different that Charles doesn't feel up to examining. Well, if Erik wants Charles to ask him to stay, that is a bloody shame. if Erik were to _offer_ to stay, that would be something different. Charles would welcome his company; of course he would. But he's not going to ask Erik. He's not going to let Erik position this in his own mind as a sacrifice he's making for Charles's sake, as if it's some sort of notch in some endless goal-keeping. Three points to Erik, for giving it up so graciously and willingly.

If Erik wants something, he can use his damn words. Charles isn't going to fill in the blanks for him.

"I suppose you'll be off soon," Charles says, as casually as he can manage.

Erik's jaw twitches. His face looks stern, if you ignore the eyes, which Charles has never quite learned how to do. "I have things I should be seeing to," Erik acknowledges. 

"Of course," Charles says.

"Though it's early yet, I suppose," Erik says, half-turning to set his gaze away, out the window, concentrating a little too intently on the drips off the porch roof. "I suppose there's time enough for one more game."

Charles takes another bite of his bread, chewing slowly. "All right," he says, finally, once he's swallowed. "One more game before you go."


	36. when words aren't enough

_You're not a monster_ , Charles tells you, but you are what you were made to be, and you know you always will be.

 _You're not a bad person_ , Charles tells you, but there's plenty of blood on your hands, and you can't truly say you would do a single thing differently.

 _You're not broken_ , Charles tells you, but if there was a time when you felt whole, you no longer remember it.

Charles doesn't say a thing, but he pulls you in close, kisses you like you're breakable, touches you like you're precious, and somewhere deep inside you something unfamiliar and strange and soft starts to slowly unfurl.

 _This is your fault_ , Charles tells you, and _I don't want what you want_ , and you stare down at the tears glimmering in his eyes, and you believe every word.


	37. a stolen kiss

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> set during dofp

Erik hadn't expected Charles's hatred. He should have, he realizes now, but somehow he never thought to picture it, not once in all of those endless days and nights in that blinding cell. 

He had thought of Charles, of course, imagined him a million times if he did it once, but it was always the Charles he knew. The Charles from before--arrogant and condescending on his best days, yes, but also kind and patient and forgiving. _That_ Charles had looked at Erik and said there was something in him Erik never saw him in himself, and Erik couldn't decide if he was a fool or a genius or both.

This is not that Charles. A decade has changed him into something angry and bitter and fragile and it's ironic, Erik thinks, that he feels as if he understands this Charles better than he ever did the Charles who loved him.

"I'm sorry," Erik says, and the words are awkward and chalky in his mouth. He's never apologized for anything he's done. He's always done what he's had to do. He doesn't say _forgive me_ , and yet there's a softness in Charles's eyes that makes him wonder. If he pushed--

He's already pushing. This is a different Charles but it's still Charles, Charles who once was his...friend, his brother, his lover. His only one. It's been ten years and everything is different and damaged and lost and Erik is hungry.

Their first kiss was sweet and soft and ridiculous, some sunny spring afternoon on the side of an American highway, weeds blooming like flowers, the unfamiliar sensation of hope and expectation springing up like a well. Their last kiss was the night before Cuba; Erik had been thinking about Shaw's death, certain that it would involve sacrificing his own life as well, and it was a sacrifice he was all too willing to make, but all the same he had hoped that the kiss would distract Charles from paying attention to those thoughts himself.

Erik has plans for Paris, tomorrow. For Raven--beautiful, strong, loyal Raven, who holds within her the destruction of the future for every mutant. There's another sacrifice that has to be made, and Erik will not hesitate.

And if Charles does not hate him now, he will hate Erik again, then. That's fine. It's even deserved. But if this is only one single and snatched moment, here on this plane, when Charles looks at him like he is not a villain, as though perhaps there is some part of Charles that remembers why he ever thought Erik worthy of any regard in the first place--

Erik will take it. Erik will steal it, whatever he can get, a kiss or more, and he'll still have it, kept for himself, when all the rest is gone again.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [six sweet seeds (the modern myth remix)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/826391) by [pocky_slash](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pocky_slash/pseuds/pocky_slash)
  * [On a Beach, With You (The Tel Aviv Remix)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/8014762) by [niniblack](https://archiveofourown.org/users/niniblack/pseuds/niniblack)




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